Higurashi started off with a young boy (Keiichi) moving to a new town before the start of a local festival which sees someone get murdered or go missing every year. Likewise, Ookami Kakushi also starts off with a young boy (Hiroshi) moving to a new town just before the start of a local festival, but the difference here is that there doesn’t seem to be any widespread knowledge of any suspicious events around the festival, but we do see a character get killed at night.

There’s also the harem factor in both Higurashi and Ookami Kakushi, but then again, there are tons of anime with harems so it’s not exactly something new. What I found similar though were the sister and brother: Isuzu and Issei. These two characters reminded me of Satoko and Satoshi from Higurashi. Both pairs of siblings seem to have a very close relationship with each other, and they’re both blond. Isuzu’s personality is also very much like Rena’s (always looking happy but troubled inside), with the exception that instead of obsessing over cute things, she obsesses over Hiroshi instead.

Isuzu and Issei are on the left, Satoko and Satoshi on the right.

Besides the scenario and the characters, what really caught my attention was the sound of cicadas in the background. It’s something you don’t really notice when watching anime, but background sounds really do help set the mood/atmosphere. In Higurashi no Naku Koro ni you could hear cicadas in almost every episode when things were calm (higurashi = cicada, after all), and it looks like Ookami Kakushi might be doing the same thing.

The similarities between these two anime shouldn’t be too surprising though considering that they were both written by Ryukishi07, but whether or not Ookami Kakushi will be successful is still up in the air. There’s not many people who would argue against how good Higurashi no Naku Koro ni was, but in my opinion, Ryukishi07′s later work Umineko no Naku Koro ni was a disappointment. Hopefully by going back to his most successful story with Ookami Kakushi, Ryukishi07 will be able to make another masterpiece. After all, when you’ve got a good formula, why mess with it?

Other than what’s posted on ANN there doesn’t seem to be any other details on the game itself however, based on the title and description there’s bound to be some supernatural elements in the game (as with Ryukishi07′s previous works). The title is a play on words, where the first part “Okami” can either mean a god or a wolf. The two are usually distinguished by writing them in Japanese Kanji, but in this case the title was written in Hiragana which is sort of like the alphabet in that it only gives the pronounciation of the word. The second word in the title “Kakushi” can either mean “concealed” or “hidden”, making the rough English translation of the title “Hidden God/Wolf”.

So some of you are probably wondering who Ryukishi07 is and why this game is so special. To be breif, Ryukishi07 started out as an amateur game developer but quickly rose to fame with the success of his Higurashi no Naku Koro ni murder-mystery series and later with Umineko no Naku Koro ni. The Higurashi games have spawned several console games, a manga, a light novel, 2 full anime seasons, a live action movie, and an OVA, while Umineko is due to receive an anime adaptation late this year. Ryukishi07 is seen as a god-like figure (or at least somewhere way up there) among many fans of the murder-mystery genre. With these credentials, I’m sure a lot of people will be looking forward to Okami Kakushi once the release date is announced.